This time last year Nikon were readying the Nikon Coolpix 800, a quick progression from the Coolpix 700, which in turn had taken the guts of the 950, made the body smaller, removed the swivel and added a fixed (in the case of the 700) and a 2x zoom lens (in the case of the 800). So it was fairly easy to predict that Nikon would do something similar this year. Obviously they've skipped the Coolpix 770 as it wouldn't be a huge seller... Instead they've gone straight for the 880 which is essentially the guts and imager from the 990 in a redesigned (fixed) case with a 2.5x optical zoom and some new features not found on the 990. This will be their main new digital product at Photokina 2000, Europe's biggest photography exhibition.

The 880 also has a few features the 990 doesn't, most notably the SCENE modes which will make it easy for beginners and more advanced users alike to select a preset shooting mode which puts the camera into
the correct setup for shooting a particular scene. In addition to this it appears that the SCENE modes also apply differing colour / contrast settings to achieve a certain "look" depending on which SCENE you've chosen. Scene shooting modes provided:

- Portrait
- Party/Indoor
- Night Portrait
- Beach/Snow
- Landscape
- Sunset
- Night Landscape
- Fireworks Show
- Close up (macro)
- Copy (black & white)
- Back light